ALOR STAR, MALAYSIA: Fifteen-year-old Halimaton Abd Rashid is free to choose any school she wants to resume her studies to prepare for her Penilaian Menengah Rendah examination this year.

State Education Department director Shahidan Abdul Rahman said the department would accommodate her request as soon as the Form Three student was ready to go back to school.

"We support her decision to return to school and we leave it to her to choose where she wants to continue with her studies," he said.

Halimaton, one of Kedah's top pupils in the Ujian Pencapaian Sekolah Rendah in 2007, has not attended school since March 22 after she ran off to stay with her boyfriend and his family in Langkawi.

On Wednesday, police said they had completed investigating her 19-year-old boyfriend, a restaurant supervisor, for rape.

The case is now with the deputy public prosecutor's office.

Meanwhile, Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Datuk Dr Masitah Ibrahim urged the authorities to investigate the case quickly so that Halimaton could be re-united with her family.

"The sooner this case is resolved, the sooner mother and daughter can resume and rebuild their lives," she told reporters after visiting the girl's mother, Normah Abd Mutalib, at her house in Kampung Lanai in Baling.

Meanwhile, Normah said Halimaton had apologised over her actions.

She said her daughter, who had confided in a relative that she was unaware of what had happened to her when she ran away from home, was eager to go back to school and realise her ambition of becoming a lawyer.